Why Do I Need Those Ship Tokens?

After combat at sea, there are various tokens on board...I vaguely remember a message about them, but can't find it to review it in the Help Section... Why do I need to collect these tokens? What do they do? I don't see them stored anywhere in my backpack. Thanks Mateys!

Those turn into items if you board or are boarded. Some are traps, from are fires, Ice, and other things. In your first ship battle they teach us this. It is also helpful to have someone on your ship to keep the decks clean.

I am confused about these too. While I am engaged in broadside combat, I can't imagine stopping to clear the deck. After it's all done, the tokens are gone. That may be because I am usually boarded or blown up.;)

telemwillP, when I'm riding along in a friend's ship, I run around on deck during the broadside battle, cleaning up the tokens so that we won't have to deal with fires and the like if boarded.

There's also at least one piece of ship equipment that has a 50% chance of eliminating the lower powered tokens when it is activated. A sails, I believe, that call a blue, bearded face that blows on your ship.